Modi debut on Chinese site; gets quick response

Ahead of his Beijing visit, Prime Minister Narendra Modi has joined Chinese microblogging service Weibo, drawing thousands of responses from netizens.

“Hello China! Looking forward to interacting with Chinese friends through Weibo" was Modi’s debut post, perhaps to ascertain the mood of people much before he flies off to Beijing reciprocating Chinese president Xi Jingping’s India visit last year.

International media reports suggested that Modi’s attempt to reach out to Chinese through their own social media platform has generated adequate response. In just five hours, Modi’s greetings had more than 20,000 followers.

"China and India are the countries that have the biggest influence in Asia and are fast developing nations. There is no reason why we can't advance together," the BBC quoted one user’s post.

Modi is an avid user of social media for several years now and often uses diverse social media platforms to reach out to people across India and the world. From sharing updates on working of the government, policy deliberations, his own thoughts, greetings and replies to well-wishers, the Prime Minister's social media outreach has been lauded all over the world, said a PMO’s official statement.